Social-trust networks such as LinkedIn® or other so-called “Friend of a Friend” (FOAF) networks provide a mechanism for an initiating user to obtain an introduction to a target user with whom they cannot readily communicate by finding one or more intermediaries to facilitate the introduction. The chain of intermediaries to the target user is known as an “introduction chain.”
One advantage of a social-trust network is that it knows who “trusts” whom, and, therefore, a social-trust network is able to generate an introduction chain from the initiating user to the target user through one or more intermediaries regardless of whether the initiating user knew that such a chain was possible or even knew any of the intermediaries.
On the other hand, social-trust networks in the prior art have disadvantages. In particular, the utility of a social-trust network is only as good as the users' efforts to register their contacts. When a user of a social-trust network fails to register a contact, the social-trust network cannot use the user and the contact as part of an introduction chain. For this reason, the need exists for improvements in the design and use of social-trust networks.